Autobiography of Friedrich Froebel

Autobiography of Friedrich Froebel

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Title: Autobiography of Friedrich Froebel
Author: Friedrich Froebel
Translator: Emilie Michaelis H. Keatley Moore
Release Date: August 4, 2005 [EBook #16434]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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AUTOBIOGRAPHY
OF
FRIEDRICH FROEBEL
TRANSLATED AND ANNOTATED BY
EMILIE MICHAELIS,
Head Mistress of the Croydon Kindergarten and Preparatory School,
AND
H. KEATLEY MOORE, MUS. BAC., B.A.,
_Examiner in Music to the Froebel Society and Vice-Chairman of the Croydon Kindergarten Company._
*"Come, let us live for our children."*
SYRACUSE, N.Y.: C.W. BARDEEN, PUBLISHER. 1889.

German Books on Pedagogy.
1. _Comenius. Grosse Unterrichtslehre._ Mit einer Einleitung, "J. Comenius, sein Leben und Werken," von LINDNER. Price $1.50.
2. _Helvetius. Von Menschen, seinen Geisteskraften und seiner Erziehung._ Mit einer Einleitung, "Cl. Adr. Helvetius, 1715-1771. Ein Zeit- und Lebensbild," von LINDNER. 12mo, pp. 339. Price $1.50.
3. _Pestalozzi. Wie Gertrud ihre Kinder lehrt._ Mit einer Einleitung, "J.H. Pestalozzi's Leben, Werke, und Grunds?tze," von RIEDEL. Price $1.25.
4. _Niemeyer. Grunds?tze die Erziehung und des Unterrichtes._ Mit einer Einleitung "Aug. Herm. Niemeyer, sein Leben und Werken," von LINDNER. 2 vols. Price $3.00.
5. _Diesterweg. Rhenische Bl?tter._ Mit einer Einleitung, "F.A.W. Diesterweg," von JESSEN. Price $1.25.
6. _Jacotot. Universal Unterricht._ Mit einer "Darstellung des Lebens und der Lehre Jacotot's," von GOERING. 12mo, pp. 364. Price $3.75.
7. _Fr?bel._ P?dagogische Schriften. Herausgegeben von SEIDEL. 3 vols. Price $7.00.
8. _Fichte._ P?dagogisch Schriften und Ideen. Mit "biographischer Einleitung und gedr?ngter Darstellung von Fichte's P?dagogik," von KEFERSTEIN. Price $2.00.
9. _Martin Luther._ P?dagogische Schrifte. Mit Einleitung von SCHUMANN. Price $1.50.
10. _Herder als P?dagog._ Von MORRES. Price 75 cts.
11. _Geschichte der P?dagogik._ in Biographen, Uebersichten, und Proben aus p?dagogischen Hauptwerken. Von NIEDERGESAESS. Price $2.50.
11. _Lexikon der P?dagogik._ Von SANDER. Price $3.50.
For sale by
*C.W. BARDEEN, Publisher, Syracuse, N.Y.*

PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.
It will be long before we have a biography of Froebel to compare with DeGuimp's Pestalozzi, of which an English translation has just appeared. Meantime we must content ourselves with two long autobiographical letters contained in this volume, which, though incomplete, have yet the peculiar charm that comes from the candid record of genuine impressions.
The first of these letters, that to the Duke of Meiningen, has already appeared in English, in a translation by Miss Lucy Wheelock for Barnard's American Journal of Education, since reprinted in pp. 21-48 of his Kindergarten and Child Culture, (see p. 146), and in a small volume under the title Autobiography of Froebel (see p. 146). While a faithful attempt to reproduce the original, this translation struggled in vain to transform Froebel's rugged and sometimes seemingly incoherent sentences into adequate and attractive English, so that the long letter has proved to most English readers formidable and repellant. But in the original it is one of the most charming productions in literature, candid and confidential in tone, and detailing those inner gropings for ideas that became convictions which only an autobiography can reveal. These qualities are so admirably preserved in the translation by Miss Emily Michaelis and H. Keatley Moore that it seemed to leave nothing to be desired. They have not only given a faithful rendering, but they have impressed upon it the loving touch of faithful disciples. Accordingly I purchased from the English publishers the American rights to this translation; and have reproduced not only this letter, but that to the philosopher Krause, with Barop's "Critical Moments," and the "Chronological Abstract," all from duplicates of the English plates.
The rest of the volume appears for the first time. The Bibliography seemed desirable, and is confined to attainable books likely to be of value to American teachers. The Index is full, but not fuller than the fragmentary character of the material seemed to require. The Table of Contents will also serve to make reference easy to the principal evens of Froebel's history.
In the lives of Pestalozzi and of Froebel many resemblances may be traced. Both were sons of clergymen. Both were half-orphans from their earliest recollections. Both were unhappy in childhood, were misunderstood, companionless, awkward, clumsy, ridiculed. Both were as boys thrown into the almost exclusive society of women, and both retained to the last strongly feminine characteristics. Both were throughout life lacking in executive ability; both were financially improvident. Both were dependent for what they did accomplish upon friends, and both had the power of inspiring and retaining friendships that were heroic, Pestalozzi's Krüsi corresponding with Froebel's Middendorf. Both became teachers only by accident, and after failure in other professions. Both saw repeated disaster in the schools they established, and both were to their last